Dictionary.net

a downward slope or bend

show unwillingness towards; "he declined to join the group on a hike"

inflect for number, gender, case, etc., "in many languages, speakers decline nouns, pronouns, and adjectives"

go down; "The roof declines here"

a downward slope or bend

of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives

go down

To bend, or lean downward; to take a downward direction; to bend over or hang down, as from weakness, weariness, despondency, etc.; to condescend.

To tend or draw towards a close, decay, or extinction; to tend to a less perfect state; to become diminished or impaired; to fail; to sink; to diminish; to lessen; as, the day declines; virtue declines; religion declines; business declines.

To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw; as, a line that declines from straightness; conduct that declines from sound morals.

To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.

To cause to decrease or diminish.

To put or turn aside; to turn off or away from; to refuse to undertake or comply with; reject; to shun; to avoid; as, to decline an offer; to decline a contest; he declined any participation with them.

To inflect, or rehearse in order the changes of grammatical form of; as, to decline a noun or an adjective.

To run through from first to last; to repeat like a schoolboy declining a noun.

A falling off; a tendency to a worse state; diminution or decay; deterioration; also, the period when a thing is tending toward extinction or a less perfect state; as, the decline of life; the decline of strength; the decline of virtue and religion.

That period of a disorder or paroxysm when the symptoms begin to abate in violence; as, the decline of a fever.

A gradual sinking and wasting away of the physical faculties; any wasting disease, esp. pulmonary consumption; as, to die of a decline.

To turn away; to shun; to refuse; - the opposite of accept or consent; as, he declined, upon principle.

To bend, or lean downward; to take a downward direction; to bend over or hang down, as from weakness, weariness, despondency, etc.; to condescend.

To tend or draw towards a close, decay, or extinction; to tend to a less perfect state; to become diminished or impaired; to fail; to sink; to diminish; to lessen; as, the day declines; virtue declines; religion declines; business declines.

To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw; as, a line that declines from straightness; conduct that declines from sound morals.

To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.

To cause to decrease or diminish.

To put or turn aside; to turn off or away from; to refuse to undertake or comply with; reject; to shun; to avoid; as, to decline an offer; to decline a contest; he declined any participation with them.

To inflect, or rehearse in order the changes of grammatical form of; as, to decline a noun or an adjective.

To run through from first to last; to repeat like a schoolboy declining a noun.

A falling off; a tendency to a worse state; diminution or decay; deterioration; also, the period when a thing is tending toward extinction or a less perfect state; as, the decline of life; the decline of strength; the decline of virtue and religion.

That period of a disorder or paroxysm when the symptoms begin to abate in violence; as, the decline of a fever.

A gradual sinking and wasting away of the physical faculties; any wasting disease, esp. pulmonary consumption; as, to die of a decline.

To turn away; to shun; to refuse; - the opposite of accept or consent; as, he declined, upon principle.

To refuse; as, to decline an invitation; bend downwards; depress; inflect, as a noun or pronoun.

A lessening; decay; a growing worse; the closing part of something; a wasting away with disease.

Deviation; sinking; decay.

To bend from, or down; to fail or decay; refuse; in gram., to inflect by cases.

To refuse; reject.

To bend down; depress; decay; diminish.

To inflect, as a noun.

The act or result of declining deterioration; decay.

Declinatio, Inclinatio, Decrementum, Remissio, Paracme, Paracmasis, (F.) Declin, from de, and clinare, 'to bend.' That period of a disorder or paroxysm, at which the symptoms begin to abate in violence. We speak, also, of the decline of life, or of the powers, (F.) Declin de lage, Lage de declin, when the physical and moral faculties lose a little of their activity and energy. See Phthisis, and Tabes.

Progressive decrease, whether of disease or of the strength or health.

A serious deterioration of the bodily powers in consequence of old age or of chronic organic disease.

A stage of decrease.

n. A falling off; tendency to a worse state; diminution; deterioration;—a gradual sinking and wasting away; consumption; phthisis.

The state of tendency to the worse, diminution, decay.